


Up In Flames

by MarsCosta



Series: Savin' Me [2]
Category: Archie Comics & Related Fandoms, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mutants, Blood and Torture, Captivity, F/F, F/M, Lovers To Enemies, Medical Experimentation, Medical Torture, Mutant Powers, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Violence, X-Men References
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:41:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25430092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MarsCosta/pseuds/MarsCosta
Summary: After Betty is taken, Jughead will do everything to find her and bring her back. Even if 'everything' means succumbing to the darkness and becoming the monster she loathed.
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Series: Savin' Me [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1836811
Comments: 12
Kudos: 37
Collections: 8th Bughead Fanfiction Awards - Nominees





	Up In Flames

* * *

_"Though this is all for you, don't want to hide the truth. When you feel my heat, look into my eyes - it's where my demons hide."_

Betty opens her eyes to the gentle caress of fingers between her shoulder blades. She leans back, silently asking for more, as she relaxes against the soft and warm fingertips, that soon turn into full palms massaging the knots away.

"Hmm." She mumbles, still sleepy, closing her eyes.

_Come on, sleepyhead. Wake up._ The sound of his thoughts invades her mental shields, and Betty smiles at the love she feels, radiating from him in waves. It takes her a moment to really grasp what's happening, but when she does, Betty opens her eyes again, turning to face him, surprise all over her face. 

"Jughead?" She asks, a little confused at the sight of him lying by her side, a relaxed and carefree smile on his handsome face. "Are you really here?" 

"Of course I am, silly." He reaches out, hand coming to touch her face gently, before tracing figures on her forehead. "I'm always here. Where else would I be?" 

Confused, she looks around. At first, she doesn't recognize her surroundings. "It's just… I thought…" She doesn't seem able to form the words so Jughead touches her again, prompting her to continue as he, laughs a little.

"You thought what, beautiful?" 

Betty stares at him for a moment, a weird pressure on the back of her neck distracts her even more, making it hard to concentrate. "I thought…"

" _I_ think you're way too tired and you shouldn't have stayed up binge-watching _Friends_ last night," he says before she can continue. "Come on. Let's have breakfast." Jughead gets up from the bed and stands there offering her his hand. Again, she studies his face, still trying to understand what's happening. Then, she takes his hand, hoping he hasn't noticed her hesitation. 

The second he opens the door and she walks behind him, Betty recognizes where they are. The yellow pastel corridor, the soft beige carpet, the expensive wooden furniture is especially impossible to forget. "Why are we here?" Jughead stops and turns around to face her. When he doesn't say anything, she speaks again. "Why are we in my childhood home?" 

As she looks at him, waiting for an answer, Betty takes in his appearance for the first time. There's something different about Jughead. He looks... thinner and… younger, but something on his face seems burdened and his posture is tense. Even back in bed, he seemed somewhat stiff. Uncomfortable. 

She looks around again and notices a jar filled with yellow roses on one of the tables in the hallway. That's when it hits her. "I gave those to my mother," she says out loud to herself. "On my fourteenth birthday. I was coming home for summer vacation after my second year at Xavier's School." Betty pauses, to look at Jughead, hoping to get any reaction from him, but he just stays at the top of the stairs looking at her. "I didn't notice before, but… your t-shirt. And those sweatpants. This… this is what you were wearing when we first met. When we rescued you from the Mutant Internment Center." As she takes a step back, despair begins to fill her. This place, this moment, Jughead. All part of her memories. "You're not real, are you?" 

"Shit. They did quite a number on you again, didn't they?" Jughead asks, shaking his head in exasperation as he takes a step forward. As he moves, Betty takes another one back. "You know what I am, Betts. I am a figment of your imagination. Your psyche concocted me up as a way for you to process all the trauma you've been going through." 

Betty freezes in her spot, the weird pressure on the back of her neck seems to increase, becoming painful as she looks at him and looks around them again, trying to make sense of it all. 

"T-trauma?" She questions, stuttering, and as she utters the words, she's taken over by her own memories. 

_Betty hears screams, guns firing. She's running and running, her legs seem like they're on fire. They need to get out. They can't get caught. She turns around, to look at him, to make sure he's behind her, but as she does that, his fist strikes her._

_The next thing she remembers is silence. A silence she hasn't heard in… forever. Then, it's all bright lights and people wearing white coats, holding syringes and strange objects and devices she can't name. She's strapped to a table, and they… they do things to her. She's screaming, she's in pain. Blinding pains she has never felt before. And when that stops, she's back to the deafening silence. And she's alone. Utterly alone._

"Betty?" Jughead's voice brings her back, and she realizes she's sitting on the floor, knees to her chest, hands holding her head. "Betty. Open your eyes." Open her eyes? She hadn't even noticed she'd closed them, but she does as he says. Upon opening her eyes and looking around, she sees she's no longer in her childhood home. 

The linoleum floor is pristine white, and so are the walls, the ceiling, the door. Everything is white. Even the scrubs she's wearing. 

"Betty?" Jughead calls yet again. He's now standing by the opposite wall, just like he had been standing by the stairs in her... dream? Vision? Delusion? She wasn't sure what that had been.

"Where am I?" She asks, even though deep inside she already knows. 

He looks at her for a moment, an almost sad expression on his face as he shakes his head and replies. "You're at the South Bronx Mutant Containment Facility." 

* * *

_One month ago…_

"Mind your tone, Blossom."

"Mind my tone? Mind _your_ tone, Queen Elsa. Remember, you need us." 

"We need you?! As if! We only called Jughead and had I known he would bring along all of you vicious snakes, I'd have thought twice." 

"Vicious snakes?! I'll give you the vicious sn--"

"Shut up. Both of you." Jughead finally says unable to keep hearing Veronica and Cheryl's stupid and unnecessary catfight. He knew it from the start that it wouldn't be easy to have the Serpents and the Mutants Underground under the same roof, but Cheryl and Veronica took it to the next level and for now, the last thing he needed was another dose of their constant bickering. 

"Don't be rude, Jughead. It doesn't suit you." Veronica's reprimand ignites him like gasoline, and in a second he's up on his feet, staring at her.

"It doesn't suit me? Do you think any of this--" he gestures between her and Cheryl, "suits Betty? You know, your best friend? The one that got caught while on a mission that was supposed to be yours?" Her face pales and without saying anything, the dark-haired girl turns around and pretty much runs out of the room. 

Jughead welcomes the silence, rubbing his hands together to settle his mutation down while he thinks. 

" _Ahem_ ," Cheryl begins from where she stands. "Not that I like Veronica Lodge or didn't enjoy seeing her run away like the petty little girl that she is, but…" She considers her words with care, having smelled smoke coming off of him in waves. "Don't you think that was too harsh?" 

"Do you know what's harsh, Cheryl? Sitting here without being able to do something, anything! It's been two weeks since she was taken. _Two fucking weeks!_ "

Reggie Mantle, leader of the Mutants Underground, chooses that moment to walk inside, having heard the commotion. 

"Betty's a strong woman, Jones." He says in a calm tone, hoping to ease off the other man's worries, but instead, something else appears on his face. 

"Have you ever been to a containment center, Mantle?" Cheryl asks in a low voice, her face dead serious and expressionless. Already knowing the answer is no -- Reggie Mantle had been one of the last few lucky bastards to attend the now extinct Xavier Institute for the Young and the Gifted -- she continues, not letting him answer. "Do you know what they do there? They bend the prisoners to their will. And those who are strong? The ones they can't bend? They break them." She pauses letting the words hang on the air. "The worst thing your friend can do right now is being strong."

At that, Jughead stands up and walks out, leaving behind a smell of smoke. Reggie moves to follow him, and Cheryl speaks again. "I wouldn't do that if I were you." 

"But you're not me, are you? I know you and Jones have been through the worst this world has to offer mutants, and I know I have no idea what all that is like, but I am trying to help." He pauses, shaking his head. "Betty's also my friend. And when I say she's strong, I mean it. She's got one of the brightest hearts I ever met and if there's anyone who can go through this, it’s her. So, retract your claws or find someone else to catfight with." 

Cheryl doesn't let his words phase her. She shrugs, staring at her perfectly manicured red nails, or claws as he'd said. "Well, let's just hope you're right about her." 

  
  


Jughead doesn't know for how long he stays outside, smoking, and thinking. His mind is being haunted by memories of Betty, memories of his time in a facility. Up to the point where they seem to intertwine, blending together with a cruelty that makes him snap and set a nearby tree on fire.

It's only as the fire starts spreading, and dark smoke rises bringing tears to his eyes, that he realizes what he's doing. 

"Shit." Jughead raises his hand, extending it towards the fire. He focuses on the flames and immediately they die out, leaving nothing but ashes behind. Ashes _._ Suddenly a voice reverberates through his mind, the past so clear as if it were the present.

_You are my son, but you're also a curse. Everything you touch turns to ashes and I will no longer be a part of it._

Guess his dear, deadbeat mother was right after all. He did turn everything to ashes. His house, his family, his own life. And now Betty. 

"Jug?" Looking away from the burnt ground, he turns around. 

"What is it, Toni?" 

"Mantle wants to talk to you. He just heard back from one of his scouts." Not waiting for her to say more, he walks back inside. One of the scouts. Maybe they finally had a lead. That's all he needed. Something. Anything. Big or small, it would be better than this… nothingness. 

Inside, Mantle isn't alone. Chuck, his right-hand man is there, along with Valerie, the mutant hacker, and so are Veronica and her human boyfriend, Archie Andrews. Once upon a time, back when he had first joined this team, the human had been the first one, aside from Betty, to welcome him and make sure he healed from his wounds. Now, however, the stare he receives from the red-head is less than friendly and tense, probably because of the redness and puffiness of Veronica's eyes. Maybe Cheryl had a point. Maybe he had been too harsh. 

"What's going on, Reggie? Did you find anything?" Something changes in the Underground leader's eyes. "What is it?" Jughead asks, tensing up.

"Valerie," Reggie says with a nod. The hacker presses something on the keyboard and suddenly, an image fills the large screen. It looks like it's from a surveillance camera, the ones that were everywhere nowadays, monitoring and controlling everything and everyone. The picture shows a normal street, with small business, and in front of what looks like a convenience store, is a tall, skinny, white male with blonde hair, eating a pretzel. Valerie presses the keyboard again, and the image zooms in and becomes more clear. 

"Chic Smith?" He questions out loud, heart filling with hope. Chic had been the mutant that tagged along with Betty on her mission two weeks ago. If he was alive, walking around maybe Betty… "Where is this? Was Betty with him?" 

Everyone looks at him with worried faces. And Archie, of all people, takes a step forward, putting a hand on his arm. "That’s not all, man."

Valerie types something in, and the picture changes to a video. Initially, it just shows Chic walking around, doing nothing. But after a few seconds, he walks inside a police precinct. "What the fuck?" He demands staring at Reggie. Most mutants who ran away and came from places like the Serpents or Mutant Underground only ended up that way for a reason. They had a record on the Sentinels system. No mutant with a record would just walk inside a police station. _Unless…_

"Valerie dug up Chic's file from the Sentinels system. Guess what. He no longer has a record. He's now an honest citizen. We have no idea how that happened. And we still don’t have anything on Betty." Reggie explains.

Jughead closes his eyes for a moment, shaking his head. Reggie and the rest of the Underground don't know what happened, but he does. Back when he was with the Hellfire Club, Penny Peabody, their psycho leader had a personal vendetta against mutants who betrayed other mutants, selling out their own kind to the Sentinels. Usually, they were low level, almost harmless mutants who got a record and were desperate for a simple, hunt-free, human life. 

"What are Chic's powers?" Toni asks, and Jughead knows she’s thinking the same. 

“He’s a class two mutant,” Valerie says, speaking for the first time. “Who is just really smart. Like genius level, for humans, except he has the X gene. Other than that, he’s normal. Harmless. Why are you asking?” 

Jughead and Toni exchange a look. Valerie had just confirmed their suspicions. 

“What aren’t you two saying?” Veronica asks quietly, clearly still sore about his words before. “I saw the way you looked at each other.” 

“Well,” Toni begins, taking a step forward. “There’s no easy way to say this, but your boy Chic? We’re pretty sure he sold Betty out to the Sentinels.” Jughead tries and fails at not flinching with her words.

“It has happened before. Mutants who betray other mutants, just to get a clean slate and a fresh start.” He explains, remembering Penny’s words. 

His words seem to be sinking in between the Undergrounders, they’re silent, thoughtful for a moment. Finally, Chuck breaks the silence, reacting faster than the others. “So, what does this mean? Other than Chic is a two-faced son of a bitch?” 

“It means he’s just become our number one lead on finding Betty,” Jughead says, cracking his fingers. “Where was this?” 

“Wilmington, North Carolina.” As Valerie answers, Reggie studies him. 

“What are you thinking, Jughead?” 

“I’m thinking we should go to Chic and have a nice chat with him.” No one in the room is dumb enough to have missed the mischief just under the surface of his words. Whatever chat Jughead was planning, it was going to be anything but nice. 

“I thought we didn’t hurt other mutants.” Archie chimes in, unsure. 

“We don’t,” Reggie replies, his voice authoritative. “We don’t harm other mutants, Jughead. And if you want us to work together, you will respect our principles.” 

At first, Reggie’s request angers him. Jughead wants to kick his ass for going all _we have principles_ on him when they should be working together to find Betty. At the same time, he and the Serpents, the ones that remained with him after everything, could afford to lose this alliance and this safe place. But then, something clicks inside his head. 

“Okay.” His simple answer was met with surprise, not only by Reggie but Toni, too. 

“Okay?” Reggie asks.

“Okay?” Toni echoes. “That’s it?” 

“This is Reggie’s house,” Jughead tells her. “We’re here as guests, and as thus, we respect his rules.” Before his answer could raise more questions, Jughead changes the subject back to finding Betty, and thank heavens, it seems enough to keep further unwanted questions at bay. Once the meeting is over, it’s dinner time and with everyone distracted by food and small talk, it’s easy for him to tell Toni to warn the Serpents to meet him outside when everyone is asleep. 

“We are going after this Chic guy aren’t we?” Cheryl whispers once they’re all together. 

“Of course,” Jughead replies. “Gotta show him what happens to traitors.” He pauses, and for a brief moment, his stomach turns at the memories of what Penny used to do to traitors. He used to hate her cruelty, but right now, standing in a grove in the middle of nowhere, he finally understands Penny’s rage. _Everything has a price, Jones,_ she used to say. And the price of betrayal had been paid in blood more times than he or anyone could actually count. 

Every mutant that had fallen at the hands of their enemies had been someone’s friend, brother, partner, lover. The traitors deserved what they got, just like Chic deserved what was to come. With that in mind, he takes a deep breath and tries to focus on the two things he needs to do tonight: get information and get revenge. 

One of the perks of having Fangs -- a strong and powerful teleporter -- on the team means they can get anywhere in almost no time. Bittersweetly, he remembers it was how he used to come to Betty every night. Fangs had a romantic heart. 

“Fangs, you’ll take us to those warehouses we saw on the map, on the outskirts of the town. While we get ready, you pick up Chic from his dorm room, quietly and quickly, and bring him to us, alright? Then, we’ll do what Penny taught us best.” 

In ten minutes they are all standing in the warehouse, waiting for Fangs. Just as Toni cracks up her fingers, Sweet Pea puts his brass-knuckles in place. Jughead watches as a flame moves between his fingers, concentrating. And that’s when he feels it. A slight change in the air statics, imperceptible to anyone who isn’t used to it, announces that Fangs is coming. In a couple of seconds, he materializes, throwing a blonde man on the floor. Sweet Pea immediately moves, grabbing Chic from the floor as if he were a rag doll, only to punch him hard across the face, sending him back to the floor. 

He tries to get up, but the punch got him good. The fact that Fangs kicks him hard in the ribs doesn’t help either. 

_That's step one. A quick beating. Enough to make the person afraid and aware._

Jughead watches Chic struggle, first for air, and then to try and get up, and for a moment he thinks of what a pathetic specimen this guy is. 

“Pick ‘im up.” He finally says to Pea and Fangs. They shove him against a pillar, holding him there. 

Once up, Chic looks around, confused, and starts screaming. _“Let go of me_ _!_ ” He yells, struggling vainly. _"Let me go!"_ When no one replies, he struggles to take a deep breath, before speaking again, this time without screaming his lungs out, but still sounding like a weak piece of shit. “W-who are you? W-what do you want?”

Jughead takes a step forward and studies his face before replying. "Names aren't important right now." He begins slowly, enunciating every word with perfect diction. "What _is_ important is the fact that _I_ am a friend of Betty Cooper." As soon as Betty's name leaves his mouth, Chic seems to lose all remaining color in his face, leaving him haggard and sickly. 

"I-I never wanted to hurt Betty." He stutters, almost sounding like he was sorry. _Almost_. 

"I'm sure you didn't," Jughead agrees, keeping his face neutral. "But we'll get to that in a bit. First, I want to talk about you, Chic." He pauses, circling him. "I heard a lot about you. A pathetic lowlife who used to use a barely existing gift to cheat on SAT's, bar exams, and admissions tests for some hundred dollars. Despite your intelligence, you were dumb enough to get caught and get the Sentinels on your ass. That's how Mutant Underground found you, on the run, alone and scared." Jughead studies his face for a moment. "From the look on your face, my intel is correct. Good. Now on to the important question. How did someone like you find a way out of the trash can that mutants’ lives are to Duke University?" 

“You’re insane!” He shouted at Jughead. “I don’t have to tell you anything!”

“Actually, if you want to walk out of here, you do,” Toni said casually from her place as if they had been having a normal conversation. Chic remains silent, defiant. 

“SP,” Jughead says, nodding at his friend, who immediately punches Chic’s face with his brass-knuckles. The blow stuns him for a second, and it takes him a long moment to come to, and he leans forward to spit blood on the floor. 

“The next one goes to your ribs,” Toni’s voice is casual once again. “And they’re already badly bruised. Another punch would easily break them and who knows, it could even puncture a lung. With no doctors here, you would be in some serious trouble.”

"I-It w-was a guy.” He says almost immediately, fear appearing in his eyes as he realizes the gravity of his situation. 

“A guy?” Jughead echoes.

“Y-yeah. T-this guy approached me one day, asking about what I would do for a new chance in the real world. At first, I thought he was either dumb, crazy, or a dreamer, but before he left he said if I ever wanted a different life, he could help me." Chic says in a painful and breathless tone that proves Toni’s gift for telling people’s injuries.

"A tracker," Toni says from behind him. "Where did he find you?" she asks him. 

"At a bar. A secret bar for mutants." Chic replies quickly, probably thinking that collaboration will help him out of this. “Everyone at M.U knows where it is.”

"What did you do after that?" SP demands in a dangerous voice. 

"I-I got curious. I kept coming back to the bar until I found him again and asked him what he'd meant." 

"What did he tell you?" The second Jughead says those words something changes in Chic's face. 

"I-I can't. H-he said I had to keep it to myself if I wanted to stay alive." 

“If you don’t tell me, you won’t be staying alive here either.” Jughead threatens.

Surprisingly, Chic laughs before his ribs get the best of him and he winces in pain. “You’re just a band of brutes. Nothing you can do to me scares me more than what will be done to me if I betray him.” 

Before anyone can say anything, Cheryl takes a step forward. "My turn, Hobo." She tells Jughead with ease. 

He doesn’t hesitate to conjure fire, a flame appearing on his palm, bright and burning hot. Cheryl puts her hand over it until her palm is touching Jughead’s palm, the flame engulfing her hand, but instead of being burned by it, her skin starts glowing, as she absorbs the power from the flame. “That’ll be enough for now.” She says a moment later, and just as it had appeared, the glowing disappeared, and she let’s go of his hand. Then, turning to Chic, she smiles, and putting a hand over his chest, she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. It only takes a moment before Chic starts sweating, feeling sick. "Feel that hotness, closet monster? That's your blood starting to boil under my touch." She pauses, watching him struggle for a long moment. When he starts screaming his lungs out, Cheryl smiles. 

_"O-Oh my god! Oh my god! Stop! Just stop!_ " He yells, trying to push her away. "S-Stop! I'll tell you everything!" 

"What did he tell you?" Jughead repeats his question. Instead of answering, Chic screams under Cheryl’s glowing touch. "Red. Red!” He calls to Cheryl. “Stop. He can’t talk if he’s busy screaming." A second later, she removes her hand, shrugging. Turning to Chic, he continues. “Answer me or she'll do her thing again and this time no one's gonna stop her."

"H-he told me I could help him. If I really wanted another chance, all I had to do was help him. That’s when he told me he worked for the Sentinels.” 

“And you believed him?” Toni asks, taking a step forward. 

“One doesn’t doubt a guy like that, you wench.” The insult immediately earns him another punch. 

“Why did you believe him?” Jughead demands.

“H-he had that neural implant on the back of his neck and he was crazy powerful! I didn’t ask twice. I just wanted my life back. He promised he wouldn’t kill me if I helped and kept my mouth shut.”

“What happened next?” 

“I had to prove myself. Give him intel, run a few errands. Once he was sure I could be trusted, he told me what he wanted.” Chic spits more blood on the floor, and Jughead notices his injuries seem to be catching up to him. “He told me he wanted the one who could read minds.” 

“Her name’s Betty, you bastard!” Jughead shouts, flames appearing on both of his hands. 

Almost immediately, Cheryl puts her hand on his arm. “He’s not done yet, Hobo. Cool it down.” Her whispered words are almost gentle. Almost. 

“I told him it was impossible to catch a telepath, and that she would see me coming for miles, but he taught me how to disguise my thoughts. Then, he made sure she would be weakened enough at the right moment.” 

“The raid on their old camp two days before,” Toni fills, and Chic nods. 

“B-Betty used her abilities to hide us, and all the sentinels found was our food stash. What they didn’t take with them they burned.” He paused, trying to breathe. “After, we needed more food or else everyone would starve. I volunteered to go into town. They were going to send the ice girl with me, but if Betty didn’t go with me, they would kill me. So I made sure she came along.” 

Enough was enough, so when flames appeared out of nowhere, climbing up Chic’s legs, mercilessly burning his clothes, his, and his flesh, no one stopped Jughead. The screams are deafening, bringing them terrible memories from their time running with Penny. 

Once Chic gets to the delicate point just before death, Jughead stops. “Let him go.” Sweet Pea and Fangs release him from their grip, and Chic falls to the ground, unable to stand on his own. “I want a name.” Stuck in a fog of unbearable pain, Chic doesn’t reply at first. “Want me to have a go at your arms?” Jughead asks, kneeling beside him when he’s had enough of waiting. 

“K-Kurtz.” He finally whispers, trembling on the floor. 

“Thank you,” Jughead says.

“Y-you w-won’t ki-kill me?” Chic stutters. And Jughead shakes his head. 

“No, buddy. You are just a message. Everyone needs to know what happens to traitors. If anyone asks what happened, you will tell them that the Serpents are coming for Elizabeth Cooper. Got it?” Chic nods. “I want to hear you say it.”

“I-I g-got it.” 

“Great,” Jughead says getting up to his feet. “You can drop him at a hospital,” He tells Fangs. The teleporter leaves with the injured and now unconscious mutant immediately, and the second he’s gone, Jughead leans forward, retching and throwing up.

“You did what you had to do,” Cheryl says from behind him. “For Betty.” 

“For Betty,” he echoes, wiping his mouth with his sleeve, and straightening up. 

Later, lying awake on his cot, Jughead shudders at the thought of what he had done. Tonight, he had allowed the monster that lived inside him to come out and play. Had she seen what he had done, Betty would have been horrified. She had always believed he could be a better man, and when she had left him back in New York, Jughead thought she was finally done with him. However, the time they’d spent together seven months ago had told him that even though she had left, she kept believing, not giving up her hopes for a better world, where they could be together again. 

Jughead wanted, more than anything, to prove her right, to be the good man she believed he could be, but the irony of ironies, in order to get her back, he had to be the worst version of himself, the monster that had driven her away years ago. He just wasn’t strong enough to be good and save her at the same time. Remembering a song he had heard some time ago, Jughead found himself whispering in the darkroom. 

“ _Forgive me for my frail love, Betts.”_ As he said those words he truly hoped she would be able to forgive him for all the things he was going to do to get her back. 

  
  



End file.
